Category: Grants Making a Difference

Did you know the Community Foundation for the Fox Valley Region was created in 1986 with $5,000 Walter L. Rugland received as part of the first “Community Service Award” presented by Aid Association for Lutherans now known as Thrivent? With this award, Walter wanted to pursue his dream of a “catalyst for change” working across […]

Harbor House Domestic Abuse Programs broke ground Wednesday on an expansion that will get the mattresses off of the floors by more than doubling the number of sleeping rooms and adding exam and work spaces. The shelter at 720 W. Fifth St. in Appleton kicked off the public phase of its Building Hope Campaign. Harbor […]

By Lynn Peters, Community Engagement Manager Ever wonder what happens after a grant ends? As part of the Basic Needs Giving Partnership within the Community Foundation, we follow up two years after each grant to find out what’s happened. A three-year, $15,750 grant in 2015 to Prevent Blindness Wisconsin  supported preschool vision screening for low-income […]

We are a community with a broad range of nonprofits doing important work to improve all aspects of life here. Likewise, the people running and overseeing these efforts bring to the job a wide range of talents and experience. A lot of organizations are putting a lot of time and effort into a way to give […]

Luke Schiller, Heckrodt’s director of education, gives viewers a sneak peek behind the scenes of “The World Above Your Feet.” In the midst of the COVID-19 crisis, Heckrodt Wetland Reserve began construction for a Children’s Canopy Walk called “The World Above Your Feet” with the hope  youth can soon explore a whole new world with […]

Environmental literacy should be available to everyone! Exactly one year ago, we reported on a very exciting dream just coming to life over at the Heckrodt Wetland Reserve: a sky-high adventure in discovering nature, designed to give those with challenges of any kind, from financial to physical, access to this learning opportunity in the trees! […]

Catalpa Health, a local mental health and wellness organization for kids, has a mission of helping children and families improve their mental health and wellness. Expanding services to Waupaca in 2018 (with significant support from funds within the Waupaca Area Community Foundation) has allowed Catalpa to serve the needs of children and families in the […]

There’s something about High Cliff State Park that makes visitors feel like they’ve entered a whole new world. With its numerous stone ledges, gorgeous hiking trails and spacious amenities, the park has become a favorite spot in the Fox Valley for weddings, reunions and retreats. So when the park’s pavilion began showing its age, the […]

Generous grants from funds within the Community Foundation supports the Appleton’s History Museum at the Castle, and are listed below. By Dustin Mack, Chief Curator, History Museum at the Castle With a flourish, John Stephens called the first meeting of the Outagamie County Pioneer Association to order at 10 a.m. February 22, 1872. And the […]

The Fox Valley is home to roughly 4,700 Hmong-Americans, yet few people know much about this ethnic group’s history, traditions, or even why they settled in Wisconsin. Now you can learn about Hmong culture through art, at no cost, thanks to grants from the Bright Idea Fund within the Community Foundation for the Fox Valley […]

With the snip of a blue ribbon, a new Day Resource Center for the homeless officially opened Monday afternoon. The center is at the site of St. Matthew’s Lutheran Church on Mason Street in Appleton, in the rooms formerly used for classrooms. The school closed several years ago and the classrooms were not being used. […]

The traveling version of the “(In)Visible: Homelessness in Appleton” exhibit from the History Museum at the Castle is getting around. Its most recent stop was at the Fox Valley Warming Shelter’s fifth annual Grateful Plateful fund-raiser at the Grand Meridian in Appleton Wednesday, Oct. 5th. The exhibit — an outgrowth of the Project RUSH survey […]